I agree, I would never want to go digging around an old military base. Its just sad more than anything to think of tens of thousands of rounds of quality ammunition just being buried like that. Also, kind of ticks me off as a taxpayer.

We always shot up the extra ammo. We were always told we could not turn in extra ammo, cause we'd get that much less next year - and we might need it to qual. So everyone got a turn gunning. It was a blast!

Originally Posted By SageEBR:I agree, I would never want to go digging around an old military base. Its just sad more than anything to think of tens of thousands of rounds of quality ammunition just being buried like that. Also, kind of ticks me off as a taxpayer.

Considering that most of them are talking about the 60's, I would not get too pissed. If you are burying ammo today it's pound-me-in-the-ass prison time courtesy of the EPA. Crates, cans, links, and brass are accounted for. Anyway, a drop in the bucket compared to other waste in gubmint.

The question is not how far. The question is, do you possess the constitution, the depth of faith, to go as far as is needed?

Don't dig on base! Just about 3 years ago they dug up an old vescicant gas round (possibly mustard gas) at a base while building a driveway. The EOD guy who got some on his skin got a pretty bad chemical burn...

I thought it was just blanks that the Army didn't want turned in. In Panama ('87-'89) they'd bring out crate after crate of blanks and expend a few of them on the field outside my antenna farm, and then chuck the unused stuff into the jungle line. Interestingly enough, the "dry season" in Panama, roughly December through April is when just about all the vegetation dies off and this time of year is prone to grass fires. EVERY STINKING YEAR. So needless to say, we had a few occasions when we couldn't leave our site because of the grass fires cooking off thousands and thousands of rounds of blanks. Some of those grass fires were actually caused by the same soldiers who tossed those blanks out of sight too-grenade simulators and smoke grenades tend to be pretty hot and cause some nasty fires. I wish they'd had some sort of rules about turning the stuff in for safety reasons at least...

"You cannot conquer a free man. The worst you can do is kill him." RAH

I remember walking in on a conversasion in the platoon Sgt's tent, when deployed, and they were talking about a construction crew coming across 2 UH-1 helicopters burried in the ground. I don't remember were, but I am thinking it was where I was stationed, Ft. Campbell. They said that at the time they were replacing all the huey's with UH-60's they tried to keep a few for the top brass and eventually had to get ride of the last few, that they weren't supposed to have, in a hurry, so they dug a big trench and drug those birds in there and burried them. Perfectly good running Huey's. I eventually saw some pics of the event which proved it true. What a friggen waste!

Up in duluth a few years ago, they dug up a parking lot to fix it or something and found either a few live gernades or morter rounds (can't remember) that were WWII vintage. Just goes to show you never know where it's safe to dig

Originally Posted By GHPorter:I thought it was just blanks that the Army didn't want turned in. In Panama ('87-'89) they'd bring out crate after crate of blanks and expend a few of them on the field outside my antenna farm, and then chuck the unused stuff into the jungle line. Interestingly enough, the "dry season" in Panama, roughly December through April is when just about all the vegetation dies off and this time of year is prone to grass fires. EVERY STINKING YEAR. So needless to say, we had a few occasions when we couldn't leave our site because of the grass fires cooking off thousands and thousands of rounds of blanks. Some of those grass fires were actually caused by the same soldiers who tossed those blanks out of sight too-grenade simulators and smoke grenades tend to be pretty hot and cause some nasty fires. I wish they'd had some sort of rules about turning the stuff in for safety reasons at least...

I know all too well about blank rounds cooking off..We used to camp out on base when I was in Boy Scouts..We would hike 5 miles to camp Devil Dog on MCAS New River..We found boxes, upon boxes, of 5.56mm blanks.. 7.62mm blanks in Links, smoke grenades, Pop flares... the works...one kid thought it would be cool to throw a box of the 5.56 blanks in the fire... was pretty cool listening to em cook off, till we started to notice that the primers were becoming projectiles... went through my tent and actually hit my scoutmaster in the back..Had more fun with MRE bombs than the blanks....

at when I was at the school of infantry in Pendleton in the mid 90's I saw belts and belts of ammo in trees and in the bush. If you did not fire your weapon you did not have to clean it was what I heard the reasoning for as the armorers would keep people cleaning for hours before libo. so to solve that I heard guys would toss belts of ammo in trees. I remember finding all sorts of stuff even Garand clips loaded all rusty.

The government will always waste as it is so so easy to spend other peoples money